


Psalm 91

by winteringinrome



Category: Gentleman Jack (TV)
Genre: Angst with a Happy Ending, Biblical Scripture References (Abrahamic Religions), Desperation, Drawers Off, During Canon, F/F, Implied/Referenced Child Abuse, Implied/Referenced Rape/Non-con, Mental Health Issues, Pre-Canon, Tribadism, happy-ish, uhhh should I do the sex tags now???
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-08-05
Updated: 2019-08-05
Packaged: 2020-07-31 00:13:25
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,778
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20105956
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/winteringinrome/pseuds/winteringinrome
Summary: Falling in love to the words of Psalm 91.Three snapshots exploring the times Ann’s life intersected with Anne’s prior to episode one, plus two looking at their relationship in the lead up to Ann leaving for Scotland. All inspired by the lines of Psalm 91.





	Psalm 91

**1815**

_I will say of the Lord, He is my refuge and my fortress: my God; in him will I trust._

The nightmares start when I am eleven and my oldest sister, Mary, dies. I dream she walks the halls of Crow Nest, pale and waxy as she was on her deathbed, that she comes to my door and is desperate to get to me. At first it is just that, Mary in my dreams. But then things worsen and, when I wake, I can’t tell straight away if I’m still dreaming or not. Then things muddle completely and I know I am awake but Mary’s still there, her thin fingers plucking at the handle of my door, her voice at the keyhole. It‘s so frightening and so dreadful that for two days I cannot leave my room for fear of what I shall find outside of it.

On the third day my father grows impatient. He sends Mother away from my bedside and orders me to get up and to dress. I am frightened of him but I am more frightened of Mary and her grasping hands.

I shake my head. “I can’t,” I say. “Please Father. She’s waiting for me, Mary, she will –”

“Mary is dead,” he says flatly.

“I know, but I heard her, she’s out there. I –”

My words are cut off when Father takes a hold of me and drags me from my bed. My bare feet skid and slide on the cold floor, desperately trying to stop our progress to the door. By the time we reach the threshold I am almost fainting with fear.

But the hallway is quite empty and still. I spin around, searching the shadows, sure Mary must be there – I heard her, I just heard her!

Father forces me round to face him and shakes me fiercely.

“See, there is no one,” He leans in very close, his eyes glittering an icy blue, “Hearing voices is the mark of the devil, Ann. Are you marked by the devil?”

I shake my head.

“Answer me.”

“No, sir.”

“Then go back to your room and dress and come downstairs like a civil child. If I hear any more of this I shall suppose you are marked after all. And do you know what happens to children marked by the devil?” His face is very close to mine. “They must have the devil beaten out of them.”

He lets go of me and I flee to my bedroom, my chin trembling with the effort to keep from crying. When the door closes behind me, I sink to the floor and I rest my head on my knees.

A sob rises from my chest and I choke it back. On the other side of the door I hear Father's footsteps retreat and Mary start up her whispering again. I knock my forehead against my knees, trying to dislodge her or drown her out. I cannot stop the tears now. Father’s voice competes with Mary's – “Are you marked by the devil, Ann?”

Am I? I think. I suppose I must be. I have never felt so low or wretched as I feel right then.

With an effort I get slowly to my feet and on numb legs walk to the dresser by my bed. I sift through my childish trinkets, my fingers clumsy. At last, in the second drawer I find what I am looking for, my Bible. It has colour plates and my name inscribed in large, careful print inside the cover. I put it down on my bedspread and kneel before it. I take a deep shuddering breath.

The Lord is my saviour, He cannot forsake me. If I am a wicked child, if I have the devil in me then He alone can help.

_Our Father, who art in heaven, hallowed be thy name, thy kingdom come, thy will be done…_

When I finish I feel no better, so I start again from the beginning. _Our Father who art in heaven, hallowed be thy name._

\--

**1823**

When our parents die the nightmares return once more.

My father was not a kind man and in death he is unkinder still. He whispers through the keyhole that he always knew I had the devil in me, that I was wicked and sinful and there was no hope for me. At night I kneel in prayer so long that my knees graze and bleed through my nightclothes.

John and Elizabeth hardly know what to do with me. Doctors are called. Companions visit to try and distract me. I sit opposite them all and say, I hear them, at night, please believe me.

When they leave, Elizabeth rounds on me. “It's mad what you're saying,” she hisses. “You're being mad.”

My lip quivers, “I'm not mad. Please don't say that!”

“Well then you must stop acting it, and stop telling everyone you come across that you are hearing dead people outside your bedroom door.”

“But I –” I start, but Elizabeth won’t let me finish.

“This, this ... _episode_ will pass, it has passed before! But if you insist on telling everyone about it, then that is all they shall hear when they look at you. You will be seen as weak and of unsound mind in the eyes of Halifax society for the rest of your life. Is that what you want?”

I know her words are meant as a kindness, but they feel as stifling as my father’s all those years before. There is something wrong with you, they say, do not let other’s see it.

After that I hold my tongue a thousand times a day. I wake from nightmares to find my chest burning and my lips bitten to shreds in my efforts not to cry out. When Doctor Sunderland calls again, I tell him I am quite recovered. And when the spirits of my parents stand outside by bedroom door that night, I cover my ears and whisper my prayers from beneath my sheets.

Silence becomes a habit soon enough. We remaining Walkers drift through the large rooms of Crow Nest like ghosts ourselves. The quietness pressing down on us, until we are dull and stupefied. And every day I think – if only I had someone to talk to, someone who'd listen and not think me mad. Oh Lord, it is a sad and lonely time. 

\--

Then one day Miss Lister of Shibden calls, dressed in a black spencer and carrying a cane, as though she is going off to battle. I think I love her right from then. 

My aunt shows her in. She strides into the drawing room, a swirl of black bombazine, smelling like rain and wet earth. It is as though the very room quivers at her arrival, shaking itself off from dust and stupour. It feels like there is fresh air and life in the house for the first time in weeks.

“Miss Walker,” she says to Elizabeth and, “Miss Walker,” to me, sitting herself down and leaning forward, “My deepest condolences on the loss of your mother. And so soon after your father too. How dreadful for you both. I am deeply sorry.”

“Thank you, Miss Lister,” Elizabeth says. “It's kind of you to call.”

“Not at all. Now tell me, do you need anything? We are neighbours, if we can be of any service to you, just say the word. How is your brother?”

“John is well. He in London for the week, sorting out the deeds to the estate. Our parents left it all in his name,” Elizabeth replies.

“It must be very quiet for you both now, alone in this house.”

“They have lots of family nearby,” my aunt says comfortably. “Plenty of people to call in on them. They are both coping very well.”

I must have made a noise at that for I am suddenly conscious that Miss Lister has turned her gaze to me. Aunt Ann and Elizabeth are watching too, the whole room tense.

“Is that so, Miss Walker?” Miss Lister says.

I open my mouth to speak but Elizabeth jumps in before me.

“Yes,” she says. “Exactly, Aunt. We are managing very well.”

But Miss Lister doesn’t turn her eyes from mine. Her face is kind and it feels like the first kind face I've seen in a long time.

“I hear them sometimes.”

It bursts from me and I instantly regret it. Now she will think me mad too. I stare at my lap and see my hands are trembling. I had not meant to say it, but now I have I feel I must explain myself. There is a great ringing in my ears.

“In the hallway sometimes. At night?”

Elizabeth shoots me a warning look, but Miss Lister leans forward, “Who?”

“My parents.” I bite my lip. “I know it's not them, of course, but it wakes me sometimes. I think I hear them just outside my door, talking to each other.”

“And what do they talk of?”

I think of my father's hateful words and swallow. “Hell,” I say simply.

Elizabeth stops me from going further, laughing shrilly, “You'll have to excuse my sister, Miss Lister, she has always been rather given to fancy.”

But Miss Lister ignores her, and leans towards me.

“Not at all, it doesn't sound fanciful to me,” She smiles at me. “It is fascinating. My Aunt Lister, who lives at Northgate, told me that just before her brother died, as she was walking along one of the passages at her father's house, she saw a black figure rush past her, very distinctly and in broad daylight, though when she turned to look behind her the passageway was empty. And when my uncle – her husband – was gravely ill, she saw the same figure at the foot of her bed while she was dressing in the morning, plain as day. She said the fright nearly made her sick. My uncle died but a month or so later.

“And I've heard other stories too. My maidservant, Cordingley, told me that after her husband died she would wake to find his boots moved about the room, left by the front door or propped, warming by the fire.

“And I think it was Edward Young – have you read _Night Thoughts_?”

We shake our heads dumbly.

“He spoke of the fine boundary between our world and that of the spirits – 'How thin the barrier!'. And I have often thought that, in grief, that boundary is sure to become thinner still.

“The Lord has made a world that is full of strange and wonderful things. So,” she leans back in her seat, smiling at me, “who am I,” she nods at my aunt and sister, “who are _we_, to say you did not hear your parents outside your door?”

I realise I have been staring at her in wonder and drop my gaze hurriedly to my lap. But her words have settled and lodged somewhere deep in my chest – not madness, I think, _grief_. A small smile plays across my lips.

“The rain has stopped,” Miss Lister says thoughtfully into the quiet and we all turn to the window. The world outside looks greener somehow than it did but an hour before, raindrops still clinging to the leaves and grass like dew, a cool, fresh wind blowing through the trees. “Shall we take a walk in the gardens, Miss Walker?”

That night when I go to bed, I sleep, for once, soundly and undisturbed.

* * *

**1824**

_Thou shalt not be afraid for the terror by night; nor for the arrow that flieth by day;_

After that, I watch for Miss Lister. Idly at first and then with an eagerness that I can't quite explain. I catch the tail of her coat disappearing into Whitley’s. The bob of her hat above the crowds on market day. Her unmistakable stride across the paths of Lightcliffe.

John catches me at it once, standing by the window, watching the Lister gig fly across the top fields, my face pressed close to the glass. I nearly trip over my skirts in my efforts to draw back.

“You should invite her to tea, you know,” he says. “She's odd enough company but our family has always been friendly with the Listers.”

“She came once before,” I say, turning back to the window. “Just after Mother died, when you were in London.”

“All the more reason for her to call again, now that the household is more lively.”

If there is a household less lively that Crow Nest, I cannot think of it. I can go days without saying more than two words to a soul.

“I'd be afraid to be poor company for her.”

John turns away, “Well,” he says, “perhaps when you're feeling a little stronger.”

I look out across the grounds, Miss Lister's carriage is still in sight, her black mare trotting briskly across the frosty ground. When she finally disappears from the horizon, I realise I have left a small mist on the pane where my breath has been, hot and damp against the glass.

\--

John’s words have put a seed in the pit of my stomach, which, once planted, I find impossible to uproot. It coils within me, unfurls, and each time I see Miss Lister stride across the horizon, it grows shoots. Sometimes the pull towards her feels so strong I fancy the idea will burst from my lips and hurtle across the space between us, spell out in vines “Please come to tea with me, Miss Lister.”

I have grown better, much better, since the new year. The dead no longer visit me at night and I am much calmer in my prayers. But all the same, when I catch sight of Miss Lister, I wonder if there's not still a little of the devil in me.

Then comes a day when she is on foot, in view from our north-facing drawing room. She passes from the east, perhaps from Clifton. I think what a fine figure she cuts across the fields. She is wearing her greatcoat today, not the spencer, and it streams and whips behind her like the fletching of an arrow.

I think to myself, I could catch up to her. I think, if I grabbed my bonnet and shawl and ran all the way I could catch up with her by the time she reaches the foot of the hill. I think, don't be so fearful, for once in your life, for God's sake.

My heart thuds in my chest and it is like the vine in my stomach has wrapped round it, tightening. Then all at once there are tendrils snaking out along my limbs, entwining my arms, my fingertips, my legs. They push me from the window, propel me out the drawing room and along the hall. They pluck up my hat and shawl. They draw me out the front door and along the path, gasping at the chill of the afternoon air.

My legs feel weak beneath me from months of barely leaving Crow Nest and my back aches, but little by little I gain on her. I am forty yards from her, then twenty, then finally I am close enough that she hears the sound of my boots, quick on the frozen path, and turns round.

“Will you come for tea?” It bursts out of me in a breathless rush, leaving a little cloud of white in the air between us. She looks at me, surprised – and no wonder! I stammer out again, “Would you like to come for tea? At Crow Nest?”

“Thank you, Miss Walker. What a kind offer.” She considers me for a moment, then “I'm afraid concerns at Shibden keep me very busy at present, but I shall endeavour to visit as soon as I am able.”

I dip my head, crestfallen.

“But will you walk with me a little way?” she continues. “I am heading back home.”

“Oh,” I say and I know I grow pink. “Of course.”

She picks up such a pace that I must run a little beside her to keep up, my hand on my bonnet to stop it from flying off. I can’t think of one single, intelligent thing to say.

Eventually I muster up, “Have you walked from Clifton?”

She shakes her head, “No, from Bailiff Bridge. They are laying a new road there and I wanted to see it in progress.”

Bailiff Bridge is nearly three miles away.

“Was it not terribly far to walk?”

“I often find, Miss Walker, by the time the horses are saddled and the carriage prepared, you could have been half the way to your destination on foot. I cannot abide time wasted.” She leans in confidentially, “Are you aware of the works of Henry Colburn?”

I shake my head.

“He has written an excellent volume on the art of employing time to the greatest advantage. It took me two afternoons to finish it and then I spent the next four days lying back and digesting it. I think he has quite cured me of my bad habits already.” She smiles at me. “Do you waste time Miss Walker? I can't imagine you do.”

“Oh I don't know,” I say. “My days seem filled with very little.”

“Mrs. Priestly says you are a keen sketcher.”

I blush, wondering if that means she has made enquiries about me, “I draw a little. John makes me sketch the ladies he admires, so he can look over them and decide which one he favours most.”

“And does your brother think you capture the ladies' admirable qualities well?”

“He has said so.” I laugh, “I'm hopeless at men though.”

“Really?” She gives me such a piercing look that I feel quite queer under the weight of it, but she only nods then and looks away. “Yes I find it quite difficult to identify the admirable qualities of men myself.” 

We round a corner and she stops abruptly, “Well Miss Walker, I shall leave you here.”

I stop short then too for I see then to my surprise that we have already reached the top of the hill on the boundary of Lightcliffe.

Miss Lister nods at me briskly and while I am still blinking at my surroundings, sets off again, her coat snapping behind her as she makes her way down the other side of the hill.

“I'll see you for tea,” I call after her and immediately wish for the vines to reappear and drag me down beneath the earth.

She does not answer, merely looks back to me and tips the brim of her hat. I don’t know if it’s the brisk pace of our walk or the gesture, but she leaves me on the path, quite breathless.

* * *

**1830**

_Nor for the pestilence that walketh in darkness;_

I have agreed to spend two days at the Ainsworths' and, from the moment I leave Crow Nest, I wish nothing more dearly than to be back home. I should not have gone at all only it was their third time in writing to invite me and Elizabeth had remarked that it was strange I hadn't called on them since last summer. I couldn't explain, could I, why I was so loathe to visit my friend again.

I regret my acquiescence as soon as I step from the carriage. It is only _him_ on the steps to greet me and when he gives me his hand to help me down it is very warm and moist. His lips too, when he presses them to my knuckles, are unpleasantly damp. I pull away as soon as I can.

“Where is Mrs. Ainsworth?” I ask as we are taken into the drawing room.

“Still in bed. Her ill health, as you know, and her years mean she is not able to rise as early as you or I.” He gestures me towards the sofa but I quickly settle myself on the single chair across from it, not daring to meet his eye.

“Has she been unwell?”

“Her chest is still quite weak. Over Christmas she caught a terrible fever and could not eat nor drink for near a week. We thought we should surely lose her then, but,” he purses his lips, “she recovered admirably. We were most relieved,” he adds hurriedly, “of course.

“Now,” he signals to his housemaid who showed us in and has been waiting by the door “Rachel, will you fetch us some tea? Unless you would care for something sweeter, Miss Walker? Some brandy perhaps?”

I shake my head. As soon as Rachel has gone from the room, he draws over a stool and comes to sit by my chair, very close.

“And how is your health, Miss Walker? You look a little pale,” he reaches out a hand and presses the back of it to my cheek, I try not to flinch. “And you're very cool, maybe you have caught a touch of cold from the journey.” He clasps my hands, “Here, let me warm you.”

I keep my gaze resolutely in my lap, my back aching from the effort of not pulling away from him.

He looks up at me, trying to meet my gaze, “I hope that staying here will do you some good, it seemed to suit you so well the last time you came.”

His hands press very close about mine and under his weight, I cannot stop them from shaking.

“Indeed, I have often thought,” he murmurs, “of your last visit.”

I feel a bile rising in my throat, sharp and choking.

“Have you thought of it too, Annie?”

Just when I think I might faint or spit or be sick, there is a great bustle and movement outside and I hear Mrs. Ainsworth calling from the hall, “Miss Walker, is that you?”

Rev. Ainsworth jumps as though scalded, and is on his feet and halfway across the room before she is fully through the door.

“Miss Walker! Welcome back to Northwich, how nice to have you with us again, are you well?”

I stand to greet her, my legs shaky with relief. “Thank you Mrs. Ainsworth, quite well.”

“Are you sure? How white you look!” She takes my hand and draws us both to the sofa. “I am so sorry to have kept you so long, I took my time in dressing as I did not expect you until later.”

“Oh?” I say and my gaze slides to Rev. Ainsworth who looks hurriedly away. “I'm sure I wrote to you to say what time I hoped to arrive.”

“Did you my dear? I don't think we received it, did you see anything Thomas?”

But before he has a chance to reply she has turned back to me and clasped my hands. “No matter, we are all here now. And you must sit with me and tell me all the news from Lightcliffe.”

\--

I try my best to be good and lively company but it is hard when he is always hovering and smirking and watching us from the corner. I feel his presence like a weight on my shoulders.

There is, however, one bright moment that afternoon.

Mrs. Ainsworth has been gossiping over her tea and has just finished recounting the exact shape and size of bonnet brazen Miss Trawton wore to church last Wednesday, when she gives a little gasp and claps her hands together, “I cannot believe I did not tell you this first,” she says “I heard quite the most thrilling tale from Mrs. Hemworth regarding an acquaintance of hers. You will know her too, in fact, your neighbour, Miss Lister at Shibden Hall?”

My breath catches in my throat, “I know Miss Lister. Well, not know,” I stammer, feeling a blush rise on my cheeks. “She has called on us before. And I have seen her,” my voice trails off lamely, “about.”

“Well then you will know of her character.”

“She is quite the oddity, I've heard,” Rev. Ainsworth interjects, but I ignore him and I turn myself fully towards Mrs. Ainsworth.

“What was the story?”

“Well let me try and remember it fully. Mrs. Hemworth did it such justice we were hanging on her every word.” She settles herself more comfortably and hums and haws, while I try not to grip her in impatience. “It was at the Rawsons’, no the Saltmarshes’, that's right. They were all at a party at the Saltmarshes’, shortly after Kit and Emma were married, and having a very agreeable time by all accounts. But, by and by, Miss Lister came to feel that one of Emma's groomsmen gave his eye too much to the ladies and was making some of them uncomfortable. She called him up on it in front of everyone – he denied it of course and she let the matter lie.

“But later on in the evening, when everyone was well into their cups, she heard tell that the same man had taken a young maid into his quarters and that there was quite a commotion coming from behind the door. Well, on hearing that Miss Lister jumped up at once without a word and ran upstairs to confront him.”

I am leaning in toward Mrs. Ainsworth, transfixed. I can picture it exactly, Miss Lister's rapid stride, her dark eyes flashing, her sharp jaw set tight in anger.

“She had a servant break open the door and caught them right in the act. By Mrs. Hemworth's telling, she marched straight to the bed, pulled out two pistols and pointed them at the man, quite the vision of vengeance. Then she told him in no uncertain terms to take his leave at once and that if she were ever to get wind of him so much as glancing at a woman askance again she would blow a hole in his britches.”

A delighted laughs bursts from me, I cannot help it. “Did she really?”

“Oh yes, goodness knows where she drew the pistols from! The poor lad was so afraid he jumped up and ran off in just his shirttails.”

I clap my hand to my mouth to try and stop the laughter from bubbling out. “What did she do then?” I say from behind my fingers.

“Why she put away the guns, returned downstairs, calm as you like, and picked up her hand of cards as if nothing had ever happened.”

I press my lips together and duck my head, still smiling.

Rev. Ainsworth scoffs, of course. He calls her improper and peculiar, but I take no mind. I look at him coolly and think, oh to have a pistol, to have a pistol and a steady arm and half the courage of Miss Lister.

* * *

**1833**

_There shall no evil befall thee, neither shall any plague come nigh thy dwelling._

When Mrs. Ainsworth dies, my old troubles start again.

The clock strikes one.

“Anne? Anne?”

“I’m here,” she sits up and leans against her pillows, blinking sleep from her eyes.

“I thought you’d gone,” I find I am sobbing. “I thought they had taken you from me.”

I crawl into her lap and she puts her arms around me. It is the second night I have woken like this, or is it the third? The voices from the landing are very loud and they do not let me think clearly.

“I’m here, don’t worry, I’ll stay.”

I turn in her arms, my skin fever-hot beneath my nightclothes. I press my mouth to hers, desperate and clumsy. “Don't go,” I say between kisses. “They say you have to but I can't bear it.”

Her hands skim lightly up and down my back, soothing me.

“You are safe Ann, you are at Crow Nest, in bed and no one is trying to take me away.”

“They said, they said…” But now I find I am not sure what they said or who said it. My head is in an awful muddle.

“It was a dream, I think,” Anne murmurs to me and brushes away my tears with her thumb. “Just a dream.”

Was it a dream? Just beyond earshot, I am sure of it now, are people that mean us harm. They are out on the landing – three men and sometimes a woman – and I am frightened of them. I press myself closer to Anne, clinging to her. I think, if she keeps touching me, if I stay within her arms they cannot get to us.

Her mouth is soft under mine, yielding but she does not kiss me back. I make a small noise of frustration and press against her more insistently.

“Ann, Ann.” Gently she pulls away from me and meets my eye. She looks so tired, “You are... you are not yourself. I'm not sure this is wise.”

“Please,” I say, “please.” I lean to rest my fevered brow against her cool one. “I know I'm sick. I know I shouldn't be hearing the voices. But you can help. This,” I gesture between us, “distracts me. You'll be helping me, please Anne.”

I put my lips to hers again, coaxing them open. Little by little she relents. When her lips are parted, I moan and slide my tongue into her mouth. She is still for a second more and then it is as though a thread snaps and she is all lips and tongue and hands, kissing me back, pulling me close, earnest and desperate as myself.

Now that I have convinced her, she moves swiftly. Without breaking from our kiss, she lifts up my nightgown and repositions me so that I kneel astride her right thigh, my bare flesh against her drawers. She places one hand on my hip and encourages me into a little rocking rhythm.

Moving in this way causes a wonderful friction between my legs, and the drag of cotton against the sensitive skin there makes me gasp. And most wonderful of all, the thrum of blood in my ears quite drowns out any sound, any thought beyond this bed and what Anne is doing to me.

The cloth beneath me begins to grow damp and I to tremble. I pluck at Anne’s hands, her nightclothes, not quite sure what I want only that I need _more_. A breathy desperate moan escapes my lips.

Anne hushes me at once. “Please Ann,” she whispers urgently. “You must try to keep quiet. Catherine will think something is wrong and come in.”

I bite my lip to try and stem the noise but cannot dampen my urge to get closer nor still my hands. I fumble at the waist of Anne’s drawers, my fingers trembling too much to undo the buttons. She puts her hand over mine and for one horrible moment I think she is going to stop me but she only pushes my hands gently aside and undoes the buttons herself. She shifts her hips to slide the drawers off and then turns us, moving me onto my back and her on top.

She nudges my legs apart and moves her hips into the V of my thighs, holding herself above me for a moment. When I realise what she intends to do, a wave of heat rolls through me.

She does it so slowly, so teasingly, that by the time she has lowered her hips and put herself to me, I am shaking with desire. That first feel of her is shocking – more intimate and more stirring than anything that has gone before. At our touch, it is as though a spark passes through me. It is more the knowledge of the act than the sensation itself, the thought of her bare flesh directly on mine. It makes me feverish and lightheaded with desire. But then the sensation too, the heat and the soft, cleaving pressure of her – I can scarce catch my breath. I think Anne feels it too, for she has shut her eyes and held herself very still, as though having to compose herself. Finally, after a long, shaky breath, she begins to move.

At first this is all she does, merely hold herself above me and shift her hips a little so that her flesh slides lightly against mine. I am transfixed by the sight of it – her dark hair against my fair and the way the drag of her body means we open against each other like the petals of a flower. Anne cannot draw her eyes from it either. So we both watch and, in watching, grow wetter and more excited.

And soon these small movements are not enough. Instinctively, I move my hips up to press myself more tightly against her. At that Anne gives a quiet groan and drops forward to bury her face into my neck.

“You will be the undoing of me,” she whispers into the hollow of my shoulder. And then quieter, so that I almost cannot make it out, “I don't know how I shall do without you.”

But before I can respond, she picks up pace with her hips, a relentless, rolling motion that thrusts us tight together and makes me lose all train of thought. We are both so wet that, below our waists, it is as though we are moving under water, gliding and slick. Our limbs are damp too, entwined around each other. We are moving in earnest now and each time she grinds against me, pleasure sparks low in my stomach.

The sweet insistent press of her is the most rousing thing I have ever felt. I start to cry out, I cannot help it. Anne doesn't quieten me this time only works her hips faster and bears down harder until I am panting and moaning beneath her.

Whereas before I had been air and insubstance, now I am purely flesh. Solid, grounded, nothing more than the sensation of her body against mine.

The sparks in my stomach have grown to a blaze that sends heat coiling across my lap, to the base of my spine and the backs of my legs. I can feel myself balanced, wavering on the edge of that great, overwhelming pleasure.

Anne knows it, as she always seems to, and alters her movements so that she no longer draws away from me with each thrust, but sets up a steady relentless grind against my flesh that is so perfectly measured, so perfectly positioned that I tip over the edge almost at once and waves of heat rush through me. My mouth opens and I gasp in pleasure and I shake and press against her, my body fluttering under hers.

Anne's eyes are on me all the while and they do not leave my face as she puts her hand down between us. I feel but do not see her fingers working quick and deft between her legs to brings on her own pleasures. Her knuckles rub against me where I am now swollen and tender and it sends little tremors through me.

I tilt back my head on the pillow and watch her. She is close already, I think, the colour high on her cheeks and her breathing ragged. Beneath the pale skin of her throat a pulse jumps in a rapid tattoo.

When I look back up to her face I see she is still watching me, and in her eyes is such a strange yearning expression that I feel quite shaken.

“Anne?” I say, and at that she comes.

She is quite silent, her mouth opening in a wordless cry. Her hips surge forward so that her hand is left trapped tight between the fork of her legs and mine. I feel the wetness of her on my thighs. She shuts her eyes, she holds her breath. She is so beautiful.

At last, her limbs grow slack. She rolls off me and turns to rest on her side so that we are face to face on our pillows.

She reaches across and tucks a stray curl of hair behind my ear, cupping her palm gently to my face. I turn and press a kiss to her palm.

“How do you feel, Ann?”

“Good,” I murmur against her hand. “Tired.”

“Will you sleep a little tonight, do you think?”

“Yes,” I reach out my hand to her now, to stroke her cheek in turn. She looks tired too, I realise, and worried, the skin under her eyes a delicate, bruised grey. At the edge of my thoughts there is the knowledge of why she is worried, but I cannot for the life of me catch a hold of it. I try to stroke the lines from her brow. “You look tired too Anne, what’s wrong?”

She just smiles at me, “Nothing shall be wrong if you just get some rest now, we can talk more in the morning.”

I smile and pull the bedclothes closer to me. The room around us is still and quiet. All quiet except for the ticking of the clock and a low persistent humming. No, not quite humming, murmuring – a soft murmur from just behind the door to the landing. I turn my head to it, puzzled, trying to identify the source of the sound.

I realise with a start that Anne has spoken to me, she’s looking at me.

“What?” I say.

“Are you warm enough?”

I nod, distractedly – now I have noticed the murmuring, I cannot ignore it. It’s just on the edge of my hearing, but if I strain a little I can start to make out the words.

Suddenly Anne is in my eye-line, I am surprised to find myself sat up, the bedclothes pushed from me. Anne is tugging gently at my shoulder. She is trying to get me to lie down again but I shake her off – if she was just still a moment and let me listen I could... She has sat up too now and put both hands to my face, trying to turn it back to her and meet my gaze but I can only look at her for a second before my eyes are drawn inexorably back to the door. What can be behind it to make such a noise? For it is a noise now, discernable voices, two, at least, if not more.

“Stay with me Ann,” Anne is saying and pressing her brow to mine. “Listen to me.”

And I try, I really try but I can hear the voices clearly now, they are too loud and oh God, my God, the things they say.

* * *

**1833**

_For he shall give his angels charge over thee, to keep thee in all thy ways._

It is two days later and I, for once, am awake before Anne. I move carefully from her arms and from the warmth of my bed and head to my writing desk. I take out the Bible I had ordered from Whitley’s – black leather, gilt edges and clasps, marbled endpapers – quite as fine, I hope, as the prayer book Anne gifted me.

I leaf through the pages until I find the section I want. In all the past days of torment, all the agonising and poring and weeping over my scriptures, these lines have stayed with me. For they are Anne, through and through.

“I see the way they look at me,” she had said last night. “The things they say.” I am not blind nor deaf to it either, of course. I know people talk of her and judge her for her strangeness.

But I think back to Anne and the points where her life intersected with mine – Anne smiling at me after Mother died and telling me I was not so strange. Anne tipping her hat to me on the Lightcliffe road, Anne with two pistols fighting for a woman's honour, Anne's arms around me every night this week.

And for all my inconstancy, my cowardice, my variable affections I hold this one truth above all things. I would not change Anne, not for anything.

I get out my pen and inkpot. I dip the nib and carefully underline Psalm 91.11. In the back I write “AW to AL” and the verse.

When the ink has dried I do up the clasps and wrap the book back in its cloth. I tiptoe back to the bed where Anne has still not stirred.

The terrors from the night-time seem a little removed from me now, and my journey to Inverness is still a few hours away. For now, I may content myself by climbing back into bed with her, pressing myself into her warmth and holding dear this moment, just as it is.


End file.
